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It depends what you plan to use as neck materials, what body materials, pickups... I guess you ask for opinion not how it would looks like, but how it would sounds?
maple is traditional tonewood for guitar building and this wood offer [COLOR=#151515]predictable dampening and stiffness factors that make it the most transparent-sounding wood. It reflects exactly what the design and the player bring to it. If you make a warm-sounding instrument and play it warmly, it sounds warm. If it is a bright and trebly guitar and played brightly, it will reflect that. It is this linear personality that endears the wood to the bowed instrument world.
Ebony isn't always with same hardness, and due that there are different efffect that ebony as tonewood produce. [/COLOR][COLOR=#151515]It can be a little heavier at times, but not necessarily so. Its response will essentially be similar to that of a rosewood like East Indian. However, it has a particular stiffness and grain structure that results in a certain low-frequency dampening. This translates into a rich, complex, and noticeably ringing overtone series that doesn’t get swallowed up by a bunch of low-end overtones. Beside this, ebony looks very classy.[/COLOR]

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I'm not bothered about looks. I have noticed that some of the greats prefer maple, i.e Clapton, Gilmour. Yet I was given to believe that maple is a brighter sounding tone, and rosewood gives a richer, as you pointed out, tone. Then of course there is the distress that a vintage maple shows after many years. I will buy an American Standard Strat and I fancy a maple neck.

Last edited by deep9400; 09-16-2014 at 05:52 AM.
Reason: add more text

A lot depends on the body wood. It came as a surprise to me when a highly respected luthier and tech told me that a maple fretboard would actually sound warmer than a rosewood fretboard if paired with a swamp ash body. At the time, I was trying to warm up my swamp ash Warmoth. I got a USACG maple neck/FB on faith alone, and was amazed to discover that he was right. There's a reason that swamp ash is paired with maple/maple - its a perfect match.

Of those two, I'm a huge Rosewood fan. I just like the feel of the wood under my fingers, and I find them easier to maintain. It's easier for me to polish the frets if I don't have to worry about the finish on the maple cap. I don't currently own any maple fingerboards, but I do have several ebony boards that I also like.

"Life's too short not to enjoy great tone."
Some contend that rock 'n roll is bad for the body & bad for the soul
Bad for the heart, bad for the mind, bad for the deaf & bad for the blind.
It makes some men crazy and they talk like fools.
Makes some men crazy and they start to drool.

I like both but one of the things I always look out for on rosewood fretboards (ebony too etc) is that there's sufficient thickness, just in case it ever needs a level and re-fret somewhere down the line.

Some rosewood fretboards I've seen are woefully thin - I always avoid those.

I have two Strats, one maple, one rosewood. They have different pups so I can't really do a proper comparison but I tend to favour the maple (possibly because I've been playing it for nearly 15 years whereas the rosewood, whilst a similar age, has only been mine for two months).

Again a direct comparison isn't possible because of the different pups, but to my ear, and to my band, the maple sounds more mellow and less 'edgy'.

“You know,” said Arthur, “it’s at times like this, when I’m trapped in a Vogon airlock with a man from Betelgeuse, and about to die of asphyxiation in deep space that I really wish I’d listened to what my mother told me when I was young.”
“Why, what did she tell you?”
“I don’t know, I didn’t listen.”

I don't know. I'd always assumed Alder, as I thought that was the standard wood for Strat bodies. Clearly I should now do some research to see if that is true. I'll try to get back to you...

“You know,” said Arthur, “it’s at times like this, when I’m trapped in a Vogon airlock with a man from Betelgeuse, and about to die of asphyxiation in deep space that I really wish I’d listened to what my mother told me when I was young.”
“Why, what did she tell you?”
“I don’t know, I didn’t listen.”

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